How would God get our attention today?

I was reading an article in the New York Times today - Worries Mount as Farmers Push for Big Harvest. I love this quote:

“We can’t snap our fingers and make high yields,” said Emerson D. Nafziger, a professor of agronomic extension at the University of Illinois. “We still depend on the weather.”

The Old Testament is full of stories of famine and disaster and the writers and prophets always saw them in the context of global warming God’s message to humanity. Remember Joseph? He was given the task of saving Egypt and the world from seven years of famine. If it wasn’t for that famine the Israelites would never have been in Egypt and never have been rescued by God using Moses.

Today the media carries on about Global Warming as if it has Divine Sovereignty over Earth…as if we control the fate of the world and not God. During the Cold War the concentration was on whether or not NATO and the USSR would destroy the world through nuclear winter. Would God really allow us to blow up the entire planet, even if it was a consequence of our own stupidity? Now we wonder whether we will flood and cook the world through burning too many fossil fuels.

Famine was been a very effective tool for getting people’s attention in the Old Testament. What would God do today? How would be get our collective attention? What would it take to wake up those who believe there is no God, that humanity determines its own destiny and we need nothing but the time to evolve beyond our superstitions. Oh that’s right, we don’t believe in that sort of God anyway. He was replaced by Jesus’ loving, tender God who is only concerned with showering humanity with blessings, not punishing them and calling them to repentance. Jesus would never condemn anyone for their sin, he wouldn’t ask people to repent. He would tell them that they are fine as they are and they should celebrate their liberation. Forget I asked.

A New English Translation of the Septuagint published

A New English Translation of the Septuagint has been published and is now available for order on Amazon (0195289757 / 978-0195289756) although they are saying it will be 1-2 months for delivery. I am sure it will be available at SBL later this month so that will probably be the first chance for most people to pick it up. Happy reading!

Polydactylism

On Tuesday, Jeshuah Fuller was born in Brooklyn with six fingers on each hand and six toes on each foot. This condition is known as sexdactyly or hexadactyly and is hereditary. The most famous person in history with this condition was the giant from Gath mentioned in 2 Samuel 21:20 and 1 Chronicles 20:6: “there was again war at Gath, where was a man of great stature, whose fingers and toes were four and twenty, six on each hand, and six on each foot; and he also was born unto the giant” (ASV). Jeshuah will have his extra digits removed in a few weeks but having them did not seem to crimp that ancient giant’s style.

What was the Septuagint’s influence on Greek?

There has long been a debate over the influence of the Greek language and culture on the Septuagint translation of the Hebrew scriptures but little has been said about the influence the latter had on the former. The Greek language gradually changed after Alexander conquered ‘the world’ and Jews played a role in this change. The Hebrew Bible was the way of life for Jews and therefore its translation into Greek would have impacted their use of that language more than that language would have  impacted them. Does anyone know of a study in which this impact is measured; ranging from little things like the use of “en” to translate the Hebrew to bigger things like the use of “kurios” for God?

Of young women and virgins

Isaiah 7:14 was viewed as a prophecy by Matthew who wrote at 1:22f: “Now all this is come to pass, that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the Lord through the prophet, saying, Behold, the virgin shall be with child, and shall bring forth a son, And they shall call his name Immanuel; which is, being interpreted, God with us.” The word used for virgin is parthenos which is a technical Greek term meaning “virgin.” Prior to period in which the New Testament was written this word meant a young woman of marriageable age without reference to her virginity. However, by the time of the NT it had come to mean a virgin. Matthew was quoting from the Septuagint which uses this word to translate a Hebrew word that means a young woman. Now young (unmarried) women are usually virgins but of course this is not always the case. Isaiah could have made his statement more exclusive and limited it to virgins but he would have had to explain his meaning because there is not a single Hebrew word for “virgin.”

Most English translation render Isaiah 7:14 as “virgin” with the exceptions being BBE, CJB, GNB, JPS, NET, NJB, NRSV, RSV. It is not surprising that a translation such as JPS or the New JPS which follow the Hebrew text and ignore the LXX rendering it as “virgin” and thus retaining the unspecific Hebrew “young woman.” However, on the other side of the equation should it surprise us that the majority of English (Christian) translations follow the LXX rendering? Is this due to their belief that this is really what Isaiah meant or is it due to the influence of Matthew’s Christian understanding of what Isaiah meant? I won’t answer that question here but will leave you with two articles to read:

Carter, Warren. “Evoking Isaiah: Matthean Soteriology and an Intertextual Reading of Isaiah 7-9 and Matthew 1:23 and 4:15-16.” Journal of Biblical Literature 119, no. 3 (2000): 503-520.

Menken, Martinus J. J. “The Textual Form of the Quotation from Isaiah 7:14 in Matthew 1:23.” Novum Testamentum 43, no. 2 (2001): 144-160.

Enjoy!

How tall was Goliath?

You may have noticed that when you read 1 Samuel 17:4 the text said that Goliath was close to ten feet tall but there was a footnote that stated that not all manuscripts read this way. Below is a break down of the various texts. They all read either six cubits and one span or four cubits and one span. A cubit is the length of a person’s forearm from the elbow to the tip of the middle finger (i.e. 18″) and a span is the length between the tip of the thumb and the tip of the little finger when the hand is fully extended (i.e. 9″).

Hebrew Bible: 9’9” (6 cubits + 1 span)
Greek Old Testament: 6’9” (4c + 1s) [Not all Greek manuscripts however]
Dead Sea Scrolls (4QSam): 6’9” (4c+1s)
Josephus (Ant. 6.171): 6’9” (4c+1s)

All English Bibles read 9-10 feet tall except the New English Translation (NET) which reads “close to seven feet tall.” Clearly the majority of translations have chosen to follow the Hebrew text. The UBS Handbook on 1 Samuel references the UBS Hebrew Old Testament Text Project and concludes that because the HOTTP fails to mention this problem the Hebrew text should be followed! (352). I am awestruck by this statement. I do however agree with the authors’ conclusion that “The height of Goliath will need to be expressed in an understandable form in the receptor language. But it need not be expressed in precise terms.”

So why would these other manuscripts/translations differ from the Hebrew text? There are two possibilities usually voiced by commentators. First the original text said Goliath was ten feet tall but later scribes thought this too unbelievable so they downsized him to a more plausible but still incredible 6′9″. We must remember that in the ancient world someone reaching five feet would be considered of fair stature. The second possibility is that Goliath started out as about seven feet tall and as in any “fish story” he grew in stature with each retelling. Most translations agree with the Hebrew text and therefore with the first explanation. This seems more likely to me as well because the Septuagint and Josephus are much later than the period from which the Hebrew text originated. The DSS may reflect a different early Hebrew text or it may reflect the consensus of its generation.

Another consideration is the weight of Goliath’s armour. The footnote in the NET states that commentators have placed it at anywhere from 126 lbs (57kg) to 200 lbs (100 kg). It seems clear that only a man of considerable size and strength could have worn such armour and managed to wield such large weapons in battle. Let’s hope that the NET revisits this issue or offers more compelling reasons for presenting a different text than all other English translations.

I have occasionally been chided for being too obtuse so let me say it plainly for those who are still unclear: Goliath was six cubits and one span tall. Goliath was soon zero cubits tall because he was defeated on account of David’s faith in God’s deliverance.